A Movie a Day: The Boat That Rocked

Saturday 23 January - THE BOAT THAT ROCKED (2009)
Really liked the look of this when I saw its trailer about a month ago, but again I was disappointed by the actual movie. Almost everything about this comedy film was actually quite good, but I didn't find it very funny--the most important part. The Boat The Rocked (released as Pirate Radio in the US) is about a fictitious pirate radio station in 1966, broadcast by a crew of disc jockeys on-board the Radio Rock ship anchored off Britain.

One of the film's most appealing traits was its ensemble cast, which included some actors I liked and knew from other works, like Nick Frost (Hot Fuzz, Shawn of the Dead), The IT Crowd's Chris O'Dowd and Katherine Parkinson, and Rhys Darby of Flight of the Conchords fame. I felt the chemistry within the cast was very fluid, natural and heartfelt but some of these guys could have been so much funnier. Of course, the movie was full of great 60s rock and pop music (hence the title's double-meaning, the boat that rocked), and to be fair it was a genuinely warming, entertaining movie, despite it lacking depth in its characters. 6/10